The invention relates to a hearing aid, particularly an in-the-ear hearing aid in accordance with the preamble of claim 1.
When designing hearing aids, two problems occur which repeatedly lead to difficulties.
On the one hand, the aim is to make in-the-ear hearing aids as small as possible, above all for cosmetic reasons.
On the other hand, the greatest possible variety of control possibilities and features is desirable. If it is then wished to dispense with a remote control, this then poses an almost unsolvable problem.
In particular, ever smaller hearing aids do not have sufficient space to accommodate control elements for volume, high or low frequency reduction, output sound level or even for selection of different transmission characteristics or a changeover switch from the microphone to the telephone coil.
This is especially critical with in-the-ear hearing aids, because the battery cover often occupies a very large proportion of the surface area accessible to the user when wearing the hearing aid.
However, battery covers with On/Off switch have been known for a long time.
As regards the state of the art, DE 35 05 390 C2 describes an in-the-ear hearing aid with a front plate and an adjoining housing with a pivotable cover, whereby said cover possesses a recess on its inner side with the dimensions of at least part of the battery and also a hole which penetrates through the cover, with a pushbutton passing through said hole and contacting the upper side of the battery. A pressure switch which allows the circuit for the hearing aid to be closed is located under the battery, which can be moved in axial direction against a certain spring tension by the pushbutton. In addition, it is known from this patent that the volume can also be adjusted by pressing the pushbutton for a shorter or longer time.
However, this known design is so complex and complicated that the striven for or realizable reduction in the size of the instrument appears to be placed in doubt.